I feel like highlighting a few bands that really stood out in my opinion. I just want to say I probably had the most fun on Thursday when I was listening to bands I mostly didn’t know. And now I have at least three new artists I’ve added onto my iTunes playlist.

The Entrance Band was the first band I saw the entire festival. Killer guitar player. Kind of a screwed up psych/blues sound.

Mayer Hawthorne and The County - I’ve already seen them live before (opening for Passion Pit), but they definitely put on a much more powerful show this time.

Lotus – A really sweet electronic kind of jam band from Philadelphia. Of course, once you say the phrase “jam band” I’m interested. I thought they had a lot of energy and their music worked really well live. (After checking out their studio material I’m not so sure how I feel about them though).

Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue – one of the funkiest acts I saw, they really got the crowd going.

Tenacious D – I’ve heard many people say this was their favorite show of the festival and I’d have to agree. They really rocked out hard, they worked in their sketches well, and it wasn’t boiling hot when they went on (not that any of the bands were in control of that).

The Flaming Lips – They performed Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, with Star Death and the White Dwarfs (who the hell are they??). I really, really, really enjoyed their renditions of the songs. It was definitely a fresh take on the album. And they had a sweet first set as well.

Mumford & Sons were another act I didn’t know a lot about, but they ended up being an incredibly good act. They brought another band out on stage to perform Wagon Wheel which is a sweet song I got to know when my band went on tour.

Dave Matthews Band – It was the first time I’ve ever really checked out DMB a lot, and I was not disappointed. Prior to this concert, I had only heard what was played on the radio, and a few songs my good friend Matty had showed me. Dave and his band really put a lot of energy forward and it was an awesome way to close out the festival.

Other bands I saw include: Stevie Wonder, Jay-Z, Weezer, The Dead Weather, Damian Marley and Nas, Norah Jones, John Fogerty, Ween, Zac Brown Band, Les Claypool, Umphrey’s McGee, Jeff Beck, GWAR, Dan Deacon Ensemble, Blues Traveler, Baroness, Dave Rawlings Machine, Jay Electronica, Neon Indian, DieselBoy

And not to mention we heard every band that played at the “That Tent”, because we were camped literally right behind it.

Whew.

This summer I am planning on writing, recording, and releasing an album of solo material. The interesting, and problematic part of the creative process (which has already begun) is that I have diversified my musical styles so much recently, I can’t think of any way I will be able to label it or put it in a genre. I suppose that is a good thing, and i’m very excited to start working full time at it.

In other news, Bonnaroo 2010 looks like it should be fun. I have my ticket and i’m itching to go.

A flyer for one of the Skank Engine shows

Finally, the tour has kicked off (as our last show was on Saturday night)! Our second and third shows of our “More Waves Than You Know What To Do With” Tour were acoustic shows, meaning we had to switch our sound up a bit. I rocked out on some djembe with Brian on his strange irish drum. Guitar became acoustic, and the bass and the horns pretty much stayed the way they are, except Tom sang and played bass as Blake played violin. Overall it was a very interesting switch, but i’m glad I can start rocking out on a drumset for our next two shows. My hands are starting to feel the wrath of my djembe playing.

In between Saturday’s show in Bloomsburg and Tuesday, I went home and visited the family. I also took Kerns home and back to campus on Monday. We stayed there for a night before finally meeting up with the rest of the band again. They were getting lonely without their percussionists. Crazy parties did ensue.

Excited for a show in Philadelphia tomorrow. If anyone is in the area and wants to check us out, see this Facebook event for more details: Philly Show

As the week goes on I’ll continue to update my blog and hopefully I will have  a few pictures up. Peace, love, and unity!

It’s a MiTiDo release. It’s not anything like my last MiTiDo release, however. Instead of focusing on the Kaossilator, I actually went the squarepushing method this time, and these are all precise, programmed songs I was working on this semester. As there are only 5 songs, I figured it made a nice EP. Each song has a bit of character and isn’t really anything like the song before it. If you get a chance, check it out!

For more of my releases, see the “Music” page, by clicking the tab closer to the top of the page.

This post stems from my disgust after seeing a Radioshack commercial which looks like it was put together by a 16 year old high school drop out.

Also, has anyone seen the Nova Song Records page I put up? It’s a good way to follow all my releases, because I don’t always release under my name, and I like to organize things. That page is the best way to keep up to date with the material I may have created but never released. Can you say “rarities”?

Why this is a cool idea: I get exposure. People get free music. BitTorrent can be used as a legal means to distribute my music, as it seems to get a lot of wrap as a piracy-only tool. Also, I used my “record label” (Nova Song) in the release, starting up a small catalogue list inside the torrent. I basically just listed all albums released under Nova Song in order of release and gave locations for their purchase/download. So if I do manage to get a fan out of any of the leechers, they can follow up my works with similar things I’ve worked on.

I’m excited, and its good to see that in the first 30 minutes of putting up my torrent, 11 or 12 people downloaded it. I guess people just like their free music.

It was nice to finally get into Michigan (Detroit Int.), even if it was at like 11PM. Went to Cedar Point the next morning with a bunch of Liz’s friends, it was a nice 2 hour drive with some total strangers. Had a good time there, even if I wussed-out of a lot of the roller coasters. The next day was filled with packing mostly all day, with a going-away dinner for my sister that night. The next day was pack, pack, pack some more, now with a truck we had to load. It was a long, long two days, and the next day wasn’t anything to scoff at either. Close to 12 hours on the highway (a 10 hour drive + 2 hours simply because the truck maxed out around 65MPH and like 55 up hills). I drove most of that, too, I’d say about 9 of those hours were mine.

Anyway, it’s nice to be home now, my sister has been doing job interviews in New Jersey, and I’ve been toying around with electronics, because I got a whole crapload of parts in the mail while I was 500 miles away. tk47srebgd

My first circuit with the Arduino

So I just got mine in the mail yesterday and already I’ve fallen in love with it. So much so that I’ve been scrounging around the house for more electronics parts. I opened up an old junk remote and scrapped an LED and a capacitor… an old motherboard gave me a 3.3 miliFarad capacitor (that’s just the start, too). I ordered some more components, such as resistors, an LCD screen, a speaker, more wires, LEDs, etc. from AllElectronics (I used to order 1/4″ -> 1/8″ adaptors from them). The thing is, they probably won’t arrive until Friday when my brother and I will be on a flight to Philadelphia. I won’t even be able to play around much with it until August rolls around.

To the right is a picture of a push button circuit I made with the Arduino (alas, only following an example). Push the button and a light goes on. Look out technology, here I come.